On Sat, 30 Apr 2005 14:19:30 -0400, JDG wrote > At 10:32 PM 4/26/2005 -0700, Nick Arnett wrote: > >The same majority party that has been cutting the funding of programs that > >preserve the lives of children is also anti-abortion. > > Which programs are those? I'm sure that you must have a specific > allegation here, right?
What budget are you looking at? Programs? Medicaid (which pays for a third of all hospital births and insures 25 million children) -- cut dramatically. WIC -- near-term increase, long-term destruction. Social services block grants -- cut. Hearing tests for newborns, cut by $60 billion. Lead hazard control program -- gone. $6.5 billion more for eduction, but $12 billion in cuts. NIH's budget frozen. Food Stamps -- 200,000 to 300,000 people becoming ineligible. Meals to low-income pregnant mothers and children cut. Low-income housing cut. Head Start switched to a block grant program. Perkins loan program for college -- gone. Pell grants -- fewer become eligible. Is there anything comparable to the tax cuts for the rich, which would similarly benefit the poor? Unless I've missed them, that's a transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich, which inevitably hurts children. The GOP wants to get rid of the earned income tax credit (which was their own invention!). The child-care tax credit was expanded -- but not for everybody -- low- and middle-income families were left out. The poverty rate for American children rose from 16.7 percent in 2002 to 17.6 percent in 2003. The number in poverty increased from 12.1 million to 12.9 million. One in six children live in poverty in the richest country on earth. The proportion of U.S. children who don't have health insurance is 11.4 percent or 8.4 million. The number of families living in poverty has gone up by 4 million since Bush took office. We have a president and Congress who are trying to make changes to Social Security that would result in a decrease of benefits, by their own numbers. How many notes do we have to hear before we can name that tune? Nick _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
